


Five things Q wanted to do and one he didn't

by CMDAK



Category: James Bond (Craig movies)
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Fluff and Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-13
Updated: 2020-02-18
Packaged: 2021-02-28 00:00:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 9,151
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22694449
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CMDAK/pseuds/CMDAK
Summary: Q decides to make a list of things he would normally go out of his way to avoid. James is his usually prat-self until he isn't
Relationships: James Bond/Q
Comments: 10
Kudos: 158





	1. Drive like a maniac

**Author's Note:**

> The story is already completed and it's shorter than what I usually write. I also got the inspiration for this while suffering through one of my usual migraines. 
> 
> Even so, I hope you enjoy it.

All of his life, Q had been careful. He had been careful with the way he talked, the way he walked, who he talked to so the older kids stopped pushing him in lockers, as well as the way he dressed so undesirables stopped confusing him with his better-off peers and robbed him of the few things he had. Granted, when he found out that he loved computers and that figuring out _technology_ was as easy as breathing he became less careful but then he reverted back to his old ways when MI6 recruited him.

His carefulness impeded his growth within MI6 but then Silva happened and the Quartermaster position was forced on him due to a technicality and because he was smart, he found ways of still being careful by tweaking the rules to permit himself, his mind, and his new minions to grow.

But now, he decided that rules and carefulness needed to be damned to hell. He was tired of politely insulting other department heads that wanted his funds to be cut and then to be forced to listen to M half-heartedly scold him. He was tired of denying his own minion things because there were rules that he couldn’t change. He was tired of not zapping double oh agents that were really asking for it because they could snap him in half without breaking a sweat – though he knew that would never happen because, 1, agents never upset him that much and 2, the agents loved him too much to hurt him even if he zapped them until they pissed themselves.

Right now, he was tired of being stuck in the back of an MI6 issued car in the middle of rush hour while his poor driver that he wasn’t supposed to know anything personal about – to the point that all drivers were forced to go by the name of _Jeeves_ – was late for his daughter’s dance.

“I’m sorry about this, Mister Boothroyd,” the driver spoke up once he registered Q’s hard glare. “If it helps, according to the GPS everyone else is also stuck in similar traffic in other parts of London.”

Q was quick to revert to his friendly smile since it wasn’t his fault. “You already got me on time to the meeting that mattered so don’t worry about this second one.” And yet, as he said that, he was reminded of the countless times Bond acted as his driver and traffic never meant anything as he zipped in and out of backstreets that looked and smelled like the world had forgotten all about them.

He supposed he was a bit jealous of Bond though he hadn’t quite figured out if that was because he was the textbook definition of ‘reckless’ or because he made it clear that he acted the way he did because he knew Q would always be there to save him.

“Stupid idiot,” Q murmured, rubbing his temples. Bond was better off acting the way he did because he thought himself to be immortal, not Q. How did he start thinking about Bond again? Oh, right… He was stuck in traffic, regretting not having a licence while watching his poor driver doing his best to get him to MI6 in a timely manner and because he preferred Bond-induced headaches over what was now the norm for the pulsating pain behind his skull.

Though, now that he thought about it, another driver at the wheel never stopped him from getting his agents where they were supposed to be in the nick of time so why couldn’t he do the same for himself? “Actually, you know what? Why don’t I get us there in record time and you make sure to charge for how long it would normally take us?”

“Mister Boothroyd, I don’t want to get you in trouble,” Jeeves said but since Q always got assigned to this Jeeves, he could easily read him and he knew that he was silently begging whatever deities he believed in that Q ignored his mandated politeness and worked his magic.

He would have been careful with that _magic_ in the past but since he just decided that life was too boring when he did that, he ensured that they had green all the way to MI6. He might have further tormented his would-be tormentors by ensuring that their reds lasted longer but that was nothing more than a pre-emptive strike for all the grief that they were sure to put him through.

The look M gave him when he was dropped at MI6 told him that he knew what he had done, but Q couldn’t find it in himself to care. But since their paths crossed, might as well put his other plan in motion. “Can you get Eve to find me an MI6-sanctioned driving instructor?”

M looked surprised and Q couldn’t blame him since he had been in the room when he told the old M that he would get a flying license before he even considered _thinking_ about getting a driving one. “Is there any disciplinary action required against this Jeeves?” M asked in a whisper, fixating the slowly disappearing car with a glare that if Q could weaponise, the world would be bowing at his feet.

“Good heavens, no,” Q was quick to dismiss, shrugging. “This extra-long day that isn’t over yet combined with the London weather finally convinced me that I need my own car and I can’t do anything with a car if I don’t have a licence.”

M sighed. “Keep the customisation of the car to a minimum and 007 as far away from it as possible, okay?”

Q didn’t hear M, busy making a list of other things he had avoided his entire life just because he had to be careful. Life was too short not to have a bucket list.


	2. Fly on whatever airplane to personally assist on a mission

Though he had his driver’s licence for three months now, Q couldn’t stop from pulling it out of his wallet every now and then and look at it, smiling.

Getting it had been hard since, as the Quartermaster, he had to go through two types of driving classes – the ‘civilian’ and the ‘high ranking MI6 employee that needs to lose whoever is tailing him without hurting any civilians while also keeping himself alive’, Q finding the former ten times harder. Then there had been the exam which involved him trying to lose two double oh agents and he suspected that he did that without any of his equipment because they cared too much about him to let him be a pedestrian for the rest of his life.

“I still can’t believe how good you look in that picture,” Eve said, appearing out of nowhere as she always did and yet startling no one because Q and all of his minions were used to deadly spies slinking in and out of their branch’s shadows. “If you ever become bored with saving the world from behind a computer screen, modelling is the way to go.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Q said, slipping the licence back in his pocket and his mood back in work-mode. “What brings you here?”

“In the end, 007 will need that USB stick you talked about during the original debrief,” she explained, squeezing Q’s shoulder when she saw his deep frown. “Don’t worry; M appointed me to—”

“I’m his handler so I’ll do it,” Q cut her off, ignoring her surprised in favour of starting to dress himself up for fieldwork.

Flying was also something he had avoided. When he had been young, his mother had told him horror stories about flying instead of explaining that they had no money and that the scholarship he was on didn’t cover any sort of field trips – especially when they were out of the country – and her words stuck with though his adulthood.

Even as a Quartermaster he avoided flying as much as possible and because MI6 deemed him to be their precious little treasure, M was more than happy to always send someone else in the field in his place even if that just made the missions last longer and increased the possibilities for something wrong to happen and Q had enough of avoiding responsibilities.

The Quartermaster before him had gone into the middle of a warzone to assist the agents and someone three times younger than him couldn’t be bothered to put up with a two-hour flight in first class to get to the peaceful city of love to hand 007 a bloody USB stick and a round of well-deserved scolding?

Eve blocked the door with her body. “Was Bond an ass about you never flying?”

Q chuckled. “Bond is an ass in general, but he has never questioned the way I do things. Nor would I change my ways just because Bond- or anyone else for that matter – teased me.” Eve had the decency to look guilty as she avoided his glare. “Now please move so I can go home and pack. My flight leaves in three hours.”

“Your flight is—” Eve looked incredulously at him and just dug her heels deeper into the floor. “Q, I’m all for you getting over your insecurities but doing that in the middle of a mission is not advised.”

Q took a step back, visibly wounded. “You were the last person I thought would think so little of me as to accuse me of being unprofessional when someone’s life is at stake.”

Properly embarrassed, Eve stepped aside to let Q pass but she grabbed his arm before he could leave. “Just promise me that you’ll stay safe and always behind Bond should you find yourself facing lots of people with guns.”

***

Once you decided something that changed your life, you were allowed five minutes to feel pure dread and regret. Q simply chose to stretch those five minutes into one hour and fifteen minutes when he also found himself to be a firm believer in God every time they run into turbulences.

He went back to his fearless persona the second the aeroplane touched the ground and he had a little skip in his step as he made his way to the waiting car – though to be fair, that skip was there more because he was picturing the face James was going to make and not because he flew without the aid of pills or alcohol.

To continue to be fair, maybe he shouldn’t have been so determined not to take any pills as his head was pounding so hard that he imagined that was the exact amount of pain someone felt when they were having their head bashed against a wall over and over again. “I’m too tired for the scenic route so take me directly to the Plaza Athénée and there’ll be an extra 20 euros in your tip,” Q said as he slipped in the cab that had the MI6 code on its side.

“I always thought that the perfect bribe for you was tea,” James said from the driver’s seat and almost gave Q a heart attack. “Then again, flying to offer me support out of all—”

“Too tired to play this game, Bond,” Q snapped, his headache becoming stronger. He should have taken that pill the second he felt his blood pressure rise and now nothing short of a strong cup of tea and a good nap induced by five of those pills could save him. “I’m pretty sure you were supposed to play the rich bachelor role as always so what the bloody hell are you doing behind this wheel? Did you crash the Ferrari we have on _loan_ already?”

James surprised Q by actually respecting the rules while pulling into traffic. “Turns out that the woman I’m supposed to seduce is a very closeted lesbian so I’m trying to befriend her instead.”

“This is what you get when a know-it-all MP insists not to double-check the information provided to us by the KGB,” Q grumbled, digging through his hand luggage for his pills. “I still don’t see how a lesbian led to you driving a cab and I’m not hearing any reassuring words about that car we don’t have budgeted in.”

“Well, she said she’ll introduce me to her husband to make my supposed sales pitch if I pick up someone in the most ridiculous way possible.” He arranged the rear-view mirror so Q could see him grinning. “I don’t think anything surpasses cabdriver landing himself someone staying at the Plaza Athénée.”

Stopping from emptying the overly priced bottle of water, Q arched his eyebrow. “Won’t it be strange that the man who acted like a dog in heat around her steps out of the car with another man by his side?”

James shrugged. “I was told Eve was going to show up but I’m sure she’s going to love this twist even more.”

Q did the stupid thing of trying to roll his eyes and just made his headache even stronger. “I need to inform you that I’ve been instructed to turn you into my personal human shield should we find ourselves in a situation that requires one, so are you sure that she’s going to buy that you lucked into picking up a gay man on your first try?”

With a sour look on his face, James had no choice but to go with the new plan that Q came up with on the spot, deciding that the punch he got as Q stormed out of the car the second they reached the hotel had a little bit too much power behind it. Still, that earned him pity points with his target, the woman ordering the best uncooked Kobe beef for him to press against his eye after she was done laughing and even used her influence with the hotel to make Q’s life harder as revenge on behalf of her new friend.

The first thing James’ new female friend did was to have Q moved into the most horrendous room available while still charging him for the suit. Q could have blocked that move without breaking a sweat – even back when he was still fixated on being _careful_ – but he opted not to for the sake of the mission. Plus, the worst that the Athénée had to offer was equal to a medium room in any Hilton and he was so tired that all he cared about was the still very soft King-sized bed.

He did get annoyed when the reception called him at 6 in the morning with the wakeup call the woman ordered for him and he was more than ready to go rogue and ruin everything she owned before the mission was complete but he fell asleep half-way through feeling around for his cell right after he had unplugged the room phone.

The next time he woke up, it was ten in the morning and a bellboy was knocking at his door because the hotel realized they made a mistake and they moved him into another room that looked exactly like the room he just left. Q didn’t need to be fully awake to realize that this was just more of the woman’s revenge and that he was going to be moved around the hotel every day until the mission was over or he apologized to James in the most humiliating way possible while she was also present.

He thought her next move would involve his breakfast but she held back from poisoning it although James assured him when he snuck in his new room at 3 in the morning that she found another way to make him suffer.

“If it’s by sending you in here to bug me at this ungodly hour, then she succeeded,” Q grumbled, turning with his back to James and pulling the pillow over his head.

James clicked his tongue and, because he was somehow horrible at reading the room, sat down on the bed next to Q and poked his back. “I found out that Laverne takes an active stance when it comes to torturing those who crossed her husband,” that got Q to stop trying to go back to sleep. “But she prefers to act like the mean girl in high school when it comes to people who mildly inconvenienced her friends.”

Q let out a sigh of relief and scooted away from James. “Figured the latter our when I had to change the room for a second time so why are you here?”

Still not reading the room, James started to use Q’s back as a pillow. “She plans on inviting you to the masquerade party she’s throwing.”

“How horrible,” Q grumbled, rolling away from James and hitting him over the head with the extra hard pillow. “Go back to your room if you’re sleepy.”

Finally getting the hint, James rolled out of bed – but instead of going out of the room as Q wanted, he started to poke his nose around. “Take no offence to what I’m about to say, Q—”

“Only way to not shoot you in the first two seconds of any conversation, Bond,” Q added.

“Your clothing is an acquired taste, to say the least,” James continued, his voice half an octave lower which implied that he was miffed by Q’s jab. “She plans on humiliating you at that masquerade…” He trailed off and Q could hear his frown. “Just how bad are the headaches that you have to take so many pills?”

“I’m your handler, so you tell me,” Q snapped, finally sitting up in bed. “Also my clothing is my own, just like my taste, so her words or anyone else’s mean nothing to me so while I thank you for worrying enough to disturb me in the middle of the night with something I was already aware of, but get the hell out of here and let me sleep. I’ll need to change rooms soon and it’s quite annoying.”

The pills jiggled as James set the bottle back down in its place. “I won’t let anything bad happen to you,” he said quietly, annoying Q that his knees didn’t pop when he crouched down next to the bed. “If you want to floor her, come by my room tomorrow night and I’ll get one of my suits to fit you. I’m quite good with a thread and needle—”

“Good night, Bond,” Q said loudly and turned away from James, sighing when he heard the room’s door click shut.

He wasn’t surprised that James knew how to sow given that his clothes tended to be shredded even faster than his equipment destroyed but hearing the genuine worry for him had shocked him to the core and he was sure that sleep will elude him for the rest of the so-called night.

He could only hope to shock James as much as that on the day of the masquerade. 


	3. Wear a suit that has the entire room look at him like he is God

Q didn’t need James to tell him that his dressing style was _unusual_. For as careful as he was about everything, he never bothered to check if two colours were supposed to go together if he liked what he saw. As an adult he was never bothered by that and yet, on his bucket list, he had added that he wanted to wear a suit that was so perfectly matched in colour and in the way it fitted him that the entire room would look upon him as if he were Cinderella crashing the nameless prince’s ball.

He supposed that was a ridiculous thing to add to the list, especially since strangers wouldn’t have a reason to look at him in awe when he wore a simple suit given that they had no idea what he normally dressed like but now… Well, he’d seen enough high school movies with mean girls in them to know that everyone’s eyes would be trained on him the second he showed up. Why not put someone cruel in their place while also striking something off his bucket list in a grandiose manner?

Laverne didn’t make him wait too long for the invitation, the snake slithering to his table the second he sat down for breakfast. “It has come to my attention that this hotel has treated you rather poorly,” she started, her voice deceptively sweet.

And Q played right along, not missing how much lower the murmuring in the room had become or how carefully James was watching him from Laverne’s table. “For the prince I paid, I had hoped for better service but there really isn’t anything that I can do except leave a bad review online and with my employers.” His cover story was the usual one provided for boffins – game devs that won their company yearly lottery and were spoiled for a certain amount of time. “Though I should have guessed what a horrible time I would have here from the second that awful stuck up rich boy confused me for a tosser.”

His jab had almost brought Laverne’s façade to an early end, but she smiled through the derogatory term. “I suppose not everyone has a sense of humour but that is neither here or there.” She pulled out a small cream-coloured envelope from inside her shirt and slipped it close to Q. “It would greatly please me if attended my masquerade party tonight to lift up your spirits. Food and drinks are on the house but you must bring your own mask. The theme is ‘animals’.”

“I would be honoured,” Q assured her, the two of them exchanging a smile before going back to their own business.

James, Q observed, looked like someone had shoved a pole up his fine arse.

***

Q hadn’t packed a _proper_ suit but it was easy to find one even if he wasn’t in Italy. It was expensive to get the suit to look on as good as he wanted it to but that was what the MI6 issued card was for. The harder thing to acquire was actually the mask which he left for last and which he eventually got by reaching out to an old friend who knew not to ask any questions. That friend also owed him more than one favour as well as a 3D printer so what Laverne thought to be the hardest task proved to be the easiest one.

He was ready way before the party started but his grand entrance demanded that he be fashionably late. And everything went exactly as he thought it would: his arrival was announced, the music was lowered, everyone turned to look at him, and Laverne looked livid as she took in the dark green slim-fit cotton three-piece suit that proved he wasn’t malnourished and his green and old mask of an Egyptian God that made his green eyes look even greener.

The whole thing lasted just a few seconds but it was enough for Q to be able to cross that off his bucket list.

“I’m happy that you could join us,” Laverne said through gritted teeth, fiddling with her own bejewelled mask to distract from her back acting. “You must tell me how you get your mask to stay on without having to readjust it every other minute.”

No longer one _not_ to antagonize potentially dangerous people, Q snarked right back. “It’s easier when you have a simple mask instead of one that’s meant to show off how rich I am.”

James intervened before Laverne could explode. “You clean up pretty good for a gamer.”

Q took a step back and looked James up and down, appreciating that he was once again wearing a dark navy suit so tight that it left little to the imagination. His simple black mask with golden antlers also helped him stand out in the crowd as it was the only one of its kind and Q supposed that he wore it more for his sake than as a hidden nod towards his ancient family emblem.

“You looked better as a cab driver,” Q said instead. “Now, if you will excuse me, I believe I was promised free food and alcohol.”

Normally, Q didn’t mind parties even if they were thrown by the villain du jour. It usually made things easier for his agents and Q expected James to use the fact that Laverne’s full focus was on him to sneak out and put the specially prepared Trojan on the USB that he flew over to good use. But James liked to surprise more than to follow a strict script so one hour into the party, he sat himself down next to Q.

“You do remember me telling you that Laverne participates in the torturing sessions, right?” His voice lacked the usual teasing tone, something that happened only when there was no returning from how badly a mission had gone and he was exposed.

“It’s the old that need to worry about their memory, not the young.”

James’ frown made his mask look almost terrifying. “This is not a game, Q. You are in danger.”

“I’m not the one who needs a constant reminder that missions aren’t games, now am I?” He subtly raised a finger to keep James from talking, the pounding headache right behind his eyes not doing anything to his mood. “I offered you a pretty good distraction to finish the bloody mission and what do you do? Squander by sitting next to the one man your target would not let out of her sight for the sake of stupidity.”

It looked like James wanted to say that he was risking everything for Q’s stupidity but he had the decency - as well as enough of a brain - to swallow those words. “What do you propose we do?” He said instead, although he already knew the answer to that by the way Q was eyeing his non-alcoholic drink.

“Let’s give her the show she’s craving and you the spotlight,” Q murmured, enjoying throwing the liquid in James’ face a bit too much and not holding back when it came to punching him for a second time that mission.

Still, on their way back home – on a train, because Q got lucky and a really strong storm hit Paris so their original flight got cancelled – happy that the mission ended up being a success, James admitted that he much preferred a few well-deserved bruises from him than from anyone else.


	4. Have a proper vacation - and maybe go skinny dipping

Q knew M would strongly suggest he go on a vacation even if both he and James had followed the mission to the letter. He also knew that rejecting or ignoring that suggestion wasn’t a bother so he didn’t even try. He just asked M for his favourite vacation places, compared those to what Eve gave him and the ones he got from his friends and then tossed a dart at a board, scoffed at the place where it landed, and then decided to spend his first day off looking for a place that he might enjoy.

James, on the other hand, took that as a personal insult and after having his version of a shouting match with M, he made his way to Q’s apartment with food from Q’s favourite Chinese restaurant and a tin of the really expensive tea that always calmed Q’s nerves.

Q opened the door before James even thought of knocking, letting the angry man stomp right to the all too familiar kitchen and plop himself in his usual chair where he started his rant. “I went out of my way to write a _proper_ report and M grounds you for making sure the mission is completed without anyone getting shot or hurt? And no, Q, you punching me doesn’t count even if I would put money on you in a fight without blinking.”

“You know,” Q started after he was sure that James was momentarily done, “I’m quite happy with going on this vacation so I do hope you didn’t talk M out of it.”

Watching James realize something was a show Q would pay to see, his jaw unclenching enough for his lips to form a little ‘o’ as his pupils dilated and made the blue around them seem darker. “I suppose I owe M another apology,” he admitted in a whisper, unboxing Q’s food for him instead of reaching for his phone. “So where are you going?”

Q shrugged. “Not that I’m planning on wasting all of it in dreary old London but inventions come easier to me than cosy places that I can relax in…” He trailed off and frowned when he saw the look James had on his face. “What are you up to? And it better not be something that ruins my vacation.”

“It’s never as nefarious as you’d like to think,” James assured him, pushing Q’s usual dish closer to him and giving him a fork which Q ignored in favour of chopsticks – another thing on his list had been to finally learn to use the things. “I was just wondering how dead set you were on the dreariness levels of your vacation place.”

***

It turned out that Q was very against his vacation spot being even 1% dreary. He was tired of always feeling like his clothes were never dry and like he was a sneeze away from the common cold so James had been kind enough to put him in contact with a friend who owed him one and shipped Q off to an exotic island were the temperature was just right and the sun was always shining.

Q smiled as he woke up in the large bed, buried between silk sheets and enjoyed the one moment in the day when his head didn’t feel like it was about to explode before turning to the bedside table to dig around for the right pill to help put a stop to that.

He glanced at his laptop, tempted only for a moment to fall back on old habits and check in on work but he stopped himself. He fully trusted R and M had made it clear that he was not to make any contact with MI6. Plus if he did that, he wouldn’t be able to cross out the next few items from his bucket list – having a proper vacation and getting a tan instead of the usual 3rd-degree burn.

The tan was coming along quite nicely if he did say so himself as was the properness of the vacation but he did feel the need to add another item on his list and then cross it off instantly when he found a crystal clear lake not five minutes away from his current house, behind a thick row of trees.

He did a bit of research to make sure that he wasn’t trespassing and that nothing deadly lied in wait somewhere just beneath the surface – a professional defect combined with one too many horror movie marathons – before finally making his way to the lake, happy when he realized that he got lucky enough to have a full moon and a sky filled with stars that made the lake itself look like the sky.

His clothes were off in the blink of an eye, discarded with little care next to the extra-large, fluffy towel he brought with him and then jumped into the water, the sudden change of temperature shocking his senseless for a moment which made him feel like he was really out in space.

He was quick to decide that so far, this was his favourite item on the bucket list. His headache was gone and while he knew that it was only momentarily, he couldn’t bring himself to care about that. Actually, even as he began to ponder how much of anything he, MI6 or their enemies mattered in the grand scheme of things given that every star that filled the sky was a world or universe in it of itself, he still didn’t care about the cruel answer.

For how could the answer be anything else but a cruel one? He was staring in the face the fact that Earth was the equivalent of a grain of sand on the never-ending beach of the universe which made him and every other human nothing more than an atom that formed said grain of sand. Not that being something as small as that rendered anyone powerless but again, would anyone outside of their grain care of they destroyed themselves.

“What thoughts plague this merman before me?” James’ soft voice cut the peaceful quietness of the world, a glimpse in the direction of the shore showing that he was decent enough not to actually be looking at his naked Quartermaster.

Q switched from floating to swimming, resting his arms on the rocks by James’ feet – very much like he imagined a mermaid might when it tried to lure a sailor in the water. “I cannot offer you any kind of field support if that’s why you’re here.

James turned a little, showing off his left arm that was in a sling. “I’m actually on downtime myself right now. R did her best, but she’s not accustomed to guiding me,” James added because Q did not try to hide his worry.

Q had many more questions but he swallowed them down, reminding himself that it was almost impossible to bring James back in one piece, especially on your first try, and R proved herself worthy of the title many times before. He was also still on vacation so he needed to be satisfied with seeing James up and about.

“If my male body doesn’t offend you, you may look my way,” Q said in a posher accent than usual.

“If my gaze doesn’t offend you, then I will do just that,” James teased back, his blue eyes going directly to Q’s own green ones, the tension disappearing from his shoulders like he had been afraid until just now that he was just imagining Q. “The tan suits as much as your usual pallor.”

Q hummed, pushing away from the edge of the lake and resuming his floating, all the while not missing James taking a quick peek at his organ before turning his attention back to the sky. “Are you going to be spending the rest of your vacation here?”

James took a moment to answer and Q realized even before he heard him talking that he had sounded like he wanted to be left alone. “I was flirting with the idea but if I’m intruding, I can always find another island where I can lick my wounds.”

“Your company can be quite nice when you aren’t destroying my things so I don’t see why we can’t share the house,” Q said quickly, moving closer to the shore once more and grabbing on to James’ leg to keep him there. “Plus, I’m flying out in the morning.”

James locked eyes with Q again and crouched down, frowning. “Rumour has it that you’ll be out for at least one more month.”

“And proper spies take rumours into consideration and investigate until they have facts,” Q murmured, flicking water in James’ face. “My vacation ends in two days and then I’m shipped off on a training exercise with the MI5 Quartermaster that will last an entire month as per her request. Now if you are done interrogating me, buzz off and let me enjoy my little dip.”

Q made to launch into a swim to the middle of the lake but James was the one who did the limb grabbing this time. “It’s just that while R is doing an excellent job for someone of her position, double oh agent miss your dulcet voice in their ear. Some more than others?”

“Some?”

James glared again but released Q’s leg in favour of starting to untie his shoelaces. “Fine. _Me_ more than others.” For someone who couldn’t really use both of arms, James did quick work of his shoes and socks and Q suspected that if he hadn’t been looking so intently at him, James wouldn’t have taken his time dropping his trousers. “The weather is a bit too much for this suit; mind if I cool myself a bit?”

Somewhere on his list, written in code and in invisible ink and scratched out of existence, was another thing Q wanted. That _thing_ had been labelled in his mind as _impossible_ and yet Q felt that it was currently being offered to him on a silver tray, so why shouldn’t he indulge at least a little? “Need a hand with the rest of your clothes?” Q asked, voice shakier than he would have wanted.

“Might need your help with more than my clothes,” James purred, licking his lips as Q pulled himself out of the water and stood before him in his naked glory. “Not a tan line in sight.” 


	5. Sleep with Bond

Gunpowder and old whiskey, that’s what James tasted like. Probably that’s what danger tasted like if danger could be tasted and Q was instantly addicted. Then again, Q might have become addicted to James’ kissing from the first second he had laid his eyes on his lips.

James was demanding and desperate in his kissing, his greedy lips leaving Q’s just enough for him to get a short breath before claiming his mouth again. And in James’ hunger to taste more of him, Q had a moment in which he was self-conscious about all of his fillings and how skimpy he had been on that morning with the toothpaste and that hesitation was misinterpreted.

“Am I losing my touch?” He whispered against Q’s lips, moving his good hand that had wandered close to his ass right back up on Q’s shoulder.

Q frowned, refusing to open his eyes. “You’re not really touching anything important so I can’t tell.” He moved James’ hand to his backside. “Why don’t you give that a test squeeze before I decide if you can handle the more _important_ equipment?”

Chuckling, James started to slowly rub Q’s backside in-between gentle squeezes. “I aim to please.” He covered Q’s lips once more with his just as he bucked forward, brushing their semi-hard organs together and swallowed the surprised moan from Q. “And to tease.”

No longer one to back down, Q shoved his hand down James’ pants and wrapped his fingers around James’ organ, giving it a light squeeze as he oh so slowly moved his hand up its length, feeling it getting fully erect. “Don’t tease unless you’re sure you can keep up,” he challenged, biting down on James’ lower lip to mix his moans with a yelp. “Now why don’t I show you how I expect the equipment to be treated and then you give it a go?”

***

They were quick to find out that the lake bank was good only for a heated handjob given James’ wounds – because of course his back and chest were covered with bruises and little cuts and no matter how horny they were for each other, Q’s lust died the second his lover flinched, the fluffy towel doing absolutely nothing to hide the harshness of the ground.

Q might have forsaken being overly-careful with himself but he never made such a concession when it came to his friends or his agents and especially not when it came to James Bond, the most danger-prone person on the planet.

“I’ve done more with worse on the bed back at the house,” James murmured in Q’s ear, stopping himself from nibbling on it and pulling back when he realized something like that to the person you were currently trying to get in said bed wasn’t his best idea. “I mean, when I’m seriously wounded and I drop off the face of the earth, this is where I usually come because the bed is so soft—”

Q kissed him to shut him up, though he couldn’t keep himself from smiling. “As long as the sheets got changed, I don’t mind if you used the bed with others.”

Wrapping his good arm around Q’s waist, James started nuzzling his ear. “I’m pretty sure our host burns the sheets after every one of my visits.”

“Then let me be the first you defile those sheets with,” Q said and kept James from talking with yet another kiss.

The expectation was for James to be as desperate and demanding in his shagging as he was in his kissing, but he wasn’t. He was slow and careful, trailing little kisses on Q’s nape before turning him around to face him and then taking his time to stretch and prepare him – for which Q was more thank thankful given that James was pretty big.

He made sure Q came first, their fingers entwined, his lips on his neck as the world exploded in a multitude of lour colours and pure pleasures, whispering assurances about how lovely he looked and how great he tasted and his eternal gratitude for being allowed to witness him like that.

James didn’t last much longer and with one final invocation of God’s name, he too was spent and content, lazily scratching Q’s back and making it clear with grunts and sloppy kisses on his neck and shoulder that he wasn’t too keen on letting him get out of bed.

“I’ll be too tired to shower in the morning.”

“Then I didn’t do a good job if you aren’t tired now,” James reasoned, turning Q’s head to him and giving him a deep kiss while also starting to slowly crawl over him.

A flinch and a pained grunt brought the distraction to an end, Q carefully pushing him back down. “Though I’m sure your ego can get any bigger than it already is, I’m also sure no one will believe you if you ever tell them this, so rest assured that you did the best job I’ve ever felt in my life.” He got pulled in a quick kiss, James’ good hand feeling right at home on Q’s backside. “I’m still going to take a shower,’ Q said breathlessly, lips numb.

“Give me five minutes and I’ll join you,” James murmured, already half-asleep.

Q didn’t take too long to wash, checking to be sure that everything was packed except for his toothbrush and toothpaste were packed before taking a damp towel and returning to carefully clean the now snoring James.

He expected to startle the deadly agent but James slept through it all and only moved to press himself against Q when he crawled under the sheets. And Q hated him for that. Leave it to James to make things harder than they already were with his warm breath brushing down his neck and his heartbeat making Q question if everything was really worth it and almost lulling him to sleep.

Time moved painfully slow when you struggled to stay awake and you were serious in your questioning if anything mattered, Q being more than grateful when a soft chiming from his phone signalled that it was time for him to go.

James remained still throughout Q’s movement in the bedroom to make sure he hadn’t left anything important behind, though it was clear that he was awake because his snoring had stopped suddenly. His breath also hitched when Q sat back down on the bed but Q continued to act like he wasn’t aware of anything even as he leaned closer to James so he could plant a chase kiss on his temple and whisper a single word in his ear.

“Freddie.” 


	6. Not die or be a burden

His head felt lighter and he was constantly cold. Adding to that, he was further frustrated by his need to run a hand through his hair and play with it when he got lost in thought. The first three times he did that only to be met with air and the feel of his own skin, he broke down in tears which only made his headache even worse but now… Now he got angry and hit the desk which also didn’t help with the pain.

Nothing short of morphine rid could him of the tumour-induced headache and that too made him angry.

The sliver light that poured into his room because the drapes were too heavy to be properly closed made him angry because every time he blinked he felt like someone was stabbing him in the brain through his eyes. The softness of his bed and pillows also irritated him because he found that if he pushed his head against something hard, a bit of the pain went away and he couldn’t do that anymore. Then there were the doctors who insisted he went outside despite the fact that all forms of light made the pain worse, the fact that everyone insisted he ate even though he was constantly suffering from nausea, and that he couldn’t focus on anything else except his pain.

Everything angered him now.

Knowing that he was being less than pleasant, he asked everyone he was close to not to visit him. He was okay with sharing how he was doing by phone but he didn’t want to snap at anyone for the smallest of reason or have to send them away after only a few minutes of seeing them face to face because they happened to drop by on a day when he couldn’t even shift his position in bed without being brought to tears.

On one such horrendous day, two weeks away from his operation, there came a knock at his door and he was less than happy. Nurses knocked and entered with a doctor in tow before he could give them the okay and since his privacy hadn’t been invaded and his blood was drawn in the morning right before he swallowed a fistful of pills, he knew that he had a visitor.

An insistent visitor, given that they knocked again which made Q feel like someone was hitting his brain with a hammer “Not in the mood for the supposedly pleasant company you want to offer, so do me a solid and buzz off,” Q shouted, glaring at the door.

“Then how about the type of company that makes you want to send me out in the field with nothing more than a paperclip and a squirt gun?” James’ voice came from the other side of the door, causing Q to hide even deeper under the covers. “I promise to be nothing less than a nuisance if you want or as silent as those two dears of yours when they find their way into the closet and express their yearning for you via expensive suit shredding, so can I come in?”

Q was drawn to the door like a moth to the flame but thee shiver that ran down his back when his shaved head made contact with the wood kept him from opening it. “I’m sleeping,” he said in a soft, shaky voice.

He heard James sigh and he liked to imagine that he too rested his head against the door. “I can’t fault you since just thinking about how boring your morning meeting with that MI5 snore is putting me to sleep and while I don’t want to wake you up, do you mind sharing your bed with me?”

The battle was already lost and James was as good as already in the room, even if Q was having a fight with him over how loud he knocked in his mind. “If you make any loud noise and wake me up, I’ll have you banned,” Q warned, covering his head with his blanket before opening the door. He did not like the intense gaze James had trained on him. “You’re not supposed to be here.”

Instead of simply looking away like any normal man would, James took Q’s words to mean that he had to hug him. Q instantly relaxed as his cold fury at the world melted a little and even his headache lessened a bit as the stinging smell of chlorine was instantly chased away by James’ natural musk mixed with the gunpowder smell that Q was starting to think would never leave him.

“Remind me when was the last time I played by the rules,” James whispered in his ear, burying his nose in Q’s neck and kissing it. “I couldn’t let you go through whatever _this_ is this on your own though I will go if you tell me.”

Q frowned and hugged James tightly. “I’m bald, you know. And I’m also in constant pain and in a bad mood and—”

A rushed, clumsy kiss in which they bumped their teeth together interrupted the depressing list. “I don’t care about your hair – although it was beautiful and I’m sure it will grow back to be even wilder and luscious than before.” James gave him another kiss, this time of Q’s forehead which rid him of his deep frown. “Everything else sounds like me on a rainy day and given that we live in London we can be two grumps holding each other and hissing at that very rude nurse who made me give up the Chinese food I tried to smuggle in.”

On cue, Q’s stomach started rumbling and if he wasn’t currently resting his head on James’ chest, James would have bolted out the door to fight with the nurse for the food. “She’ll give you the food back if you eat it the garden since some patients are on a diet and the smell would be even more torture,” Q explained because of _course_ he knew what James was thinking.

“Then let’s go have a picnic and before you say anything about the light…” James trailed off, digging through one of his bags, pulling out a pair of sunglasses. “M said you can’t stand light right now so asked R to help improve them. Oh and Eve knitted you a hat.” He held out a misshapen lump of wool that looked like the best thing Q had ever seen because of all the hard work he knew went behind it. “However, it gave me a rash when I tested so she bought you one and made me promise never to show you that but she recently sent me on a wild goose chase and you need a good laugh.”

James continued to pull all sort of gifts from his bags – framed pictures, cute cat plushies, boxes of tea from all over the world, various books on every possible subject that he was interested in and oversized comfy shirts that felt like they were made from the softest material in the world – and Q suddenly felt like he was drowning in sadness that he couldn’t explain, his eyes stinging with unshed tears.

Said tears didn’t go unnoticed by James so he pulled Q into a tight hug before falling back on the bed. He didn’t say anything and Q was thankful for that because he didn’t need anyone’s apologizes or cheering for something that he had no control over and because it also kept him from devolving into a sobbing mess.

They sat like that for over half an hour, James brushing his lips against Q’s forehead every now and then and gently rubbing his lower back in a non-sexual manner while Q clung to him for dear life until Q’s stomach reminded them of his constant hungry state.

“One of the items on my very lame bucket list was having a picnic with someone that’s closer to me than a friend or a relative,” Q said with half a voice, unaware of how cute James found him when he was being shy.

Pulling Q over him, James stole a little kiss. “You finding your bucket list boring is normal given that you spend most of your days weaponizing credit cards, making fast cars into deadly cars, guiding international spies to safety on very dangerous missions, hacking everything that’s supposedly un-hack-able and disabling satellites…” He trailed off and attacked Q’s lips, pulling him on top and sneaking his hands under his shirt. “I bet even my kisses are boring compared to that.”

Q weakly flicked his nose. “Mister Bond, are you fishing for compliments?”

“Well, my lover did leave me alone on an island after our first night together after sharing with me his name just because he probably thought and hoped I was still asleep, so I am feeling a bit insecure.” He didn’t hide his smile when Q rushed to give him a deep kiss, hugging him tighter. “I take it that I qualify for that picnic with you now, _Freddie?_ ”

The soft smile Q had disappeared instantly and he climbed off of James. “I’m not here for stress, you know.”

James flinched. “I don’t know the exact reason why you’re here since I _do_ understand what privacy means, but I know that it’s life-threatening.”

“Brain-tumour,” Q spat out, feeling his blood start to boil. “I know I’m lucky that they found it in time and that it’s in a place where they can operate on it with a pretty high chance of success but I can still come out with medium to severe brain damage or not come out again.” He didn’t realize that he had started crying until hot tears hit his fisted hands and he was quick to turn with his back to James. “Most of the time I don’t know if I want to cry about it or break everything in sight because the tumour is pressing up against a part of my brain that apparently controls my mood.”

“Why not break everything while you’re crying?” James asked with no trace of sarcasm or mockery in his voice, wrapping himself once more around Q and resting his cheek on one of his shoulders. “I’ll even help you with the destruction and either do my best to stop your tears or simply hold you. Of course, as mentioned before, I can also go and leave you alone although it should be clear that I don’t want that.”

“Don’t you understand that I might not be here at the end of this month to save you?”

“I don’t care,” James snapped, hugging Q tightly. “Those in our field of work rarely have a happy future so why should we worry about that? Why shouldn’t we focus on _now_ and enjoy it as much as we can?”

Q let out a strangled noise and for a moment, James thought that he had managed to escalate his angry crying to bawling but then Q turned in his arms and it was obvious that he was laughing. “I never thought you’ll say something that makes sense.” He covered his mouth and forced himself to calm down. “Do you see what I mean by mood swings?”

“I don’t care,” James insisted once more, letting go of Q to recover the sunglasses. “Lunch?”

“Lunch,” Q agreed, slipping on the sunglasses and also grabbing the hat Eve bought him.


End file.
